


left by the ocean, waiting for a right time

by justsleepwalkin



Category: Kingdom Hearts
Genre: Gen, post-kh1, pre-kh2
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-02-19
Updated: 2014-02-19
Packaged: 2018-01-13 00:31:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 1,430
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1206175
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/justsleepwalkin/pseuds/justsleepwalkin
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Collection of works focused on Kairi post-KH1 and pre-KH2. Easier for me to do it as a chaptered work, rather than a series. Each chapter is it's own story.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. shadow

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sometimes I see this boy in a black robe across the water at the island of our old hang out.

Sometimes I see this boy in a black robe across the water at the island of our old hang out. These days it's Tidus and Wakka that go there the most, at least of kids that I know well enough from my class. This boy stands out amongst every bit of the islands. I know he can't be from around here, but who is he?

Something about him is... familiar. Whatever it is causes me to pause on the hilltop with schoolbooks in hand and just watch him, like maybe if I stare long enough I'll remember that part of me I'm missing.

And then like a shadow escaping as the sun rises, he's gone. If I go over there and wait long enough, could I see him again? Could he possibly have the answers that I seek? _Do you know Riku? Why do you remind me of... someone?_

Selphie would tell me not to bother if she knew about it (I keep this to myself, it's probably better that way because like my dreams, I can't explain it).

Eventually, I stop looking for him. It's been too long since I've last seen him... Again I find myself without answers to my questions, and I'm beginning to wonder if the boy in black was ever really there at all, or just the shadows playing with my mind again.


	2. things she fears

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There were many things that didn’t scare Kairi.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Written for justprompts @LJ. http://i39.tinypic.com/bh14ee.jpg hiding

There were many things that didn’t scare Kairi. She was brave, for a girl--or at least that’s what the boys of her class thought. Even Selphie made comments that Kairi amazed her sometimes. But right now, Kairi was terrified. She pulled the comforter over her head, trying to block out the sounds of the storm raging outside her windows, threatening to pull apart her home. Her caretakers were out for the weekend, visiting some friends, and at the time when the sun was out and a breeze danced through her hair, Kairi had said that she would be fine, _don’t worry about me._

Kairi screamed and bundled up tighter. With her eyes closed, everything was much worse. Her mind was plagued. A darkness in the sky, swirling violet, magenta, blue. Lightning. Shadows moving, yellow eyes. _The door has opened._ Kairi shook, afraid to look outside, afraid of what she might find. _A door… a door and a boy… and then… emptiness. Nothing. Cold feelings, and yet her heart was warm._

She desperately waited for the storm to be over.


	3. just this once

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There was a dance coming up in town and Kairi wanted to go, but Riku was still gone and Selphie was sick.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Written for justprompts @LJ. One word: persuade.

There was a dance coming up in town and Kairi wanted to go, but Riku was still gone and Selphie was sick. She didn’t much want to go alone. _Just this once?_ she had asked Tidus with an innocent grin, cutting him and Wakka from their path as they were leaving the school. First they had been stunned, then Tidus grew embarrassed and (looking a bit relieved) let Wakka drag him away from her.

She folded her arms, annoyed, distantly gazing out to the other island. Determination sparked somewhere within her and she chuckled. “I’m going to make this work, you’ll see,” she told the island.

Kairi found Tidus again the next day at lunch. They were serving barbecue chicken fingers (a rare variety of the norm; Tuesdays they normally just got plain chicken fingers) and Wakka had gotten himself (victoriously) to the front of the line, sending mocking looks to his friend.

Tidus sighed. “Bummer,” he grumbled, staring at the long line. _This_ was what he got for skipping class. He was only late to get in line because he was doing a dumb make-up quiz. He was fairly sure he didn’t even pass. Waste of time.

“Wow, by the looks of that line, they’ll be sold out if anyone else hops in.” Kairi approached him where he strewn himself over a table. She grinned, arms hidden behind her back.

“I _know_ ,” he groaned, “don’t remind me.”

“Wakka not going to get you any?”

“’course not. My best bud is gonna act like he’s not my best bud and over-dramatically eat his helping in front of me.” He wasn’t kidding. Kairi had seen this happen before.

She looked contemplative. “Well, you know…” she pulled out from around her back a tray of fresh food. He started at the smell of it, and his eyes widened. He couldn’t believe it. “I already ate. I don’t _need_ another helping… Shouldn’t let it go to waste….”

“Oh man, Kairi, can I have it?”

People often forgot that while Kairi’s heart was full of light, she still knew how to manipulate people at times. She grew up hanging around three boys and one other girl. Maybe someone else, too, but she couldn’t remember most of the time. 

“You can,” she told him, but still held the tray out of his reach, “ _if_ you go to the dance with me.”

Tidus looked torn. He hadn’t eaten breakfast that morning; he was _starving_. “Aw come on! That isn’t fair at all! …And… Wakka’d be on my case _forever_!”

“Then tell Wakka it’s his fault, because he wouldn’t get you lunch.”

Tidus sat back and let out a whine of frustration. _Girls_.

“It’s getting cold…”

“Alright! Alright, I’ll go! Just let me have the tray!” After she placed it down before him, a smile on her face, he glowered back up at her. “Just this _once_.”

Wakka appeared weaving through a crowd of students to them. He stared at Tidus eating, stunned. “Whoa, man! How’d you get your food ’fore me??”

Kairi shuffled off, quite satisfied. She wouldn’t traumatize Tidus any longer. Wait until she told Selphie!


	4. summer

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Summer vacation, at long last.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Written for justprompts @LJ. http://i40.tinypic.com/e8lov4.gif summer

Summer vacation, at long last. The last few weeks of school were filled with last minute tests, papers, and a _boatload_ of lab experiments in that one class. She began to take out how _crazy it all had been_ on her lab partner, Selphie, who couldn’t actually blame her. They had to share the pain of it all, after all. 

She was distantly longing that because school had now let out, Riku would, knowingly, return. Hey, he wouldn’t have to attend classes then, right? Still… part of her knew that they wouldn’t see him, and so she ran as quickly as she could with her bag of books back home to change into her swimsuit and meet the others at the beach. Time for some real fun! Kick back and forget all about school, except for trying to convince Tidus _not_ to burn the books now that they were done.

Better to sell them or something, right? If he couldn’t handle _keeping them_ , at least. What he should have done was given them back to her teachers like he was supposed to, but whatever. It seemed like Tidus and Wakka always broke the rules whenever they could.

_“They’ll forget about it come next year!”_

_“Why did you take ’em anyway, Tidus? You don’t_ like _books!” Selphie had said._

_“Hey! I don’t mind books! I’m perfectly fine with books!”_

_“Except these ones though, ya?” Wakka remarked._

Kairi splashes her friends before floating along the water’s surface. She can see other students already making their way along the beach, even some of the teachers - none of the ones Tidus stole books from, though. Still, she points them out so that he knows to clam up about it. Wouldn’t want them to pass on the word, or anything like that. 

The weather is beautiful, perfect for the start of their summer. Only a small wisp of a cloud in the sky. She reaches up towards it, as if she could pluck it out and make the blue spotless. As if Riku was on that cloud and she could pull him to her. As if her memories would stop being so jagged. She could pin up what she had on the blue sky, and there would be so many holes shining through…

“ _Kairi_! Stop being so thoughtful! School is _over_!” 

She smiles and forces a laugh, splashing Selphie again. “Sorry, that last lab report is bogging down my mind,” she lies. “Are you sure we didn’t forget anything?”

“It doesn’t really matter if we did, Kairi, all our other ones were _perfect_.”

“Yeah. You’re ri--” She sinks beneath the ripples, dunked by Tidus or Wakka or both. She struggles more than she has to, but it isn’t because of the water rushing around her, but because she sees blurry faces behind her eyelids that she feels she should know, and one that she doesn’t, and when she surfaces again and sputters, she can’t recall either of them, but without them… she knows she feels emptier.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> That's it for now. At least, that's all of my old writing.


End file.
